Yemeni Security Official Killed in South

Yemeni authorities said Sunday that an unidentified gunman has killed a senior security official in the southern part of the country, where separatist tensions are mounting.

A provincial official said Jalal al-Uthmani, a high-ranking intelligence officer, was killed late Saturday in a hail of gunfire outside his home in restive Abyan Province.

Also Saturday, tribesmen in eastern Maarib Province blew up an oil pipeline in retaliation for raids targeting al-Qaida sympathizers.

North and South Yemen formally united in 1990 but many in the south say the northern-based government has used unification to funnel resources out of their territories, while denying southerners political rights.

Most of Yemen's oil facilities are located in the south, which lost a brief 1994 civil war that ended with the region overrun by northern troops.